Beauty and the Beast AU
by logyn
Summary: Loki is the beast, Natasha is beauty. Based on the Disney version of the film but I focus more on them and not the other characters even though near the end Barton is meant to represent Gaston. So they meet, get off to a bad start, save each other and fall in love. Might be a little shorter than I anticipated and some things don't make sense. I don't own the characters.


Loki was a young prince of Asgard, but when he was informed of his true heritage; a Jotun, he locked himself away in a castle far away on Midgard, cursing his friends to be his servants but, not as people; as every day objects. The only way to break the spell and for Loki to feel truly happy and not be in his Jotun form was for someone to fall in love with him, if he didn't find love by the time his rose lost all the petals, he would remain Jotun forever. Years passed and Loki lived alone until a man stumbled into the castle. A trespasser. Loki soon found him and locked him in a cell straight away.

Natasha was an ordinary girl in a quiet village where everyday was like the one before and full of little people in a little town. On that particular day her father had gone to a fair in another town, all was well until her father's horse came running back spooked. Natasha steadied the horse and asked the animal to take her to her father. The horse obeyed and Nat came face to face with towering iron gates. She pushed them open, slowly making her way to the huge castle, unaware that it was the home to Loki. Without knocking she made her way in, for some unknown reason it seemed colder in the castle than it was outside. Natasha spied a flicker of light in the corner of the huge circular room.

"Hello? I'm looking for my father, can you help?" she called out and followed the light upstairs to the dungeons. She saw her father in one of the cells and ran to him immediately.

"Nat, you have to get out of here" he warned her with a cough.

"I can't leave you. Not here" she answered feeling eyes watching from behind her. She quickly turned and came face to face with the pale blue faced, ruby red eyed Jotun prince.

"Who are you? What are you doing here?" he growled walking closer to Natasha her eyes full of fear and worry.

"I came to find my father, let him go! He's sick" Natasha pleaded.

"He's my prisoner" Loki answered her.

"P-please" Natasha was almost in tears. "Take me instead"

"You would do that for him?" Loki's expression softened.

"If it means saving him" she nodded.

"Natasha no!" her father warned as Loki pulled him out of the cell and out of the castle not even letting Nat say goodbye.

Natasha was sat on the stone cold floor, crying into her hands. Back downstairs Loki was being bothered by his 'friend' who had been cursed as a candlestick Fandral.

"You can't let her stay in the dungeon, take her to a room of her own" he told Loki. Giving in to Fandral, Loki made his way to the dungeons and over to Natasha.

"Come with me, I'll show you to your room" he said to her.  
"What?" Natasha raised an eyebrow.

"Well, do you want to stay in the dungeon?" Loki retaliated.

"No" she shook her head in return.

"Then come with me!" Loki growled, he led her down the cold stone stairs and into a carpeted hallway with many unused rooms. He opened the door to one and shoved her in.

"Enjoy your stay here, the castle is your home now. You can go anywhere that you would like. Except the West Wing" Loki told her.

"What's in the West Wing?"

"It's forbidden!" he answered shortly.  
"Invite her to dinner" Fandral whispered in his ear.

"You will join me for dinner. That's not an option to say no to!" he slammed the door and Natasha became overwhelmed and leant with her back against the door crying into her knees.

In a few hours, the dinner had been prepared but Natasha had not turned up. Loki was pacing the room, back and forth.  
"Why hasn't she come yet?" Loki growled, as the door began to open. Loki looked up thinking that it was her, but it wasn't it was just Voltage (who had been cursed as a vintage clock.)

"Well?" Loki raised a brow.

"She's not coming" Volstagg answered, as soon as Loki heard those words his jaw clenched and he ran upstairs to the door to her room.

"WHY WONT YOU COME TO DINNER!?" he shouted.

"I'm not hungry" Natasha answered.

"Be gentle" Fandral told the prince.

"Will you join me for dinner?" Loki asked bluntly.

"No!" she answered.

"Fine, if you wont eat with me. Then you will not eat at all!" he growled and left, heading towards the West Wing.

It was about an hour later when Nat came out of the room and down into the dining room.

"Oh hello Miss! Welcome what can we do for you?" Fandral asked.

"I am a little hungry" Natasha told him.

"Well, why didn't you say so? We'll whip you up something straight away!"

"No, no, no! Loki has asked us not to let her have any food!" Volstagg replied.

"Oh, but we can't let her starve! Have some heart Volstagg" Fandral told his friend.

After Natasha's amazing and musical dinner, Fandral and Volstagg had decided to give her a tour.

"So what's up there?" Natasha asked pointing up to some stairs to the right.

"Oh no. You don't want to look up there" Fandral and Volstagg stood in front of her.

"What's up there?" Natasha asked again.  
"Oh, it's just the West Wing. Nothing up there at all"

"Then there should be no reason why I can't go up there" Nat replied with a smirk.

"Oh no, there are far more interesting things, like the gallery and the library"

"You have a library?" Natasha asked with fake amazement,

"Yes! Just follow us!" Fandral and Volstagg turned and walked in another direction, as Natasha made her way up the flight of stairs and into a room. A room with a small table in the middle, with a mirror and a rose enclosed in a glass case floating. Natasha removed the glass case and almost touched the rose, before Loki emerged snatched the glass case and covered the rose back up, glaring at Natasha.

"I told you that you couldn't come in here" he growled.

"I'm sorry-" Natasha started.

"Get out!" Loki yelled at her, knocking over another table. Natasha didn't need to be told twice as she ran out of the castle took her horse and rode through the forest, soon to be met with a pack of wolves. The horse bucked and Natasha fell off, she grabbed a stick from the snow to defend herself, but the wolves were still attacking from all sides. That's when a burst of ice came after one of the wolves and Loki came through the forest. He fought off all of the wolves, party with his magic and partly with his ice. Natasha watched in a new awe as he looked over to her, but then collapsed in the snow. Natasha lifted him up, putting him on the horse.

Once back at the castle Loki was sat in his armchair, and Nat was tending to his wounds. Loki winced whenever she touched him.

"Don't make so many movements, just hold still" she told him, but Loki still winced.

"I said hold still!" she told him again.

"Well, I would if it wouldn't hurt so much!" Loki answered.

"Well, it wouldn't hurt so much if you just hold still"

"This wouldn't of happened if you didn't run away"

"Well, I wouldn't of run away if you hadn't scared me"

"You shouldn't of been in the West Wing!"  
"Well, maybe you need to learn some manners!" she looked at him straight in the face.

Loki was about to say something back but his expression softened.

"Thank you for trying to help me" he whispered.

"Thank you for saving me" she smiled a little at him.

After a few days of getting to know each other and becoming more like friends, Natasha and Loki were outside in Loki's garden. The snow was fresh on the ground and Natasha had suggested that they try to feed some birds. She was an expert at it, but Loki seemed to be forcing the birds and they just flew away. Natasha took his hands, emptied some bird food into his hands and put them down slowly. The birds ate the bird food out of his hand and he smiled. Natasha left him to it and had a small walk around the garden, when she looked back Loki was surrounded by birds. She laughed lightly to herself and made herself a snowball throwing it at Loki. The birds fluttered away and Loki looked over at Natasha who had a smirk on her face. The prince smiled and made an even bigger snowball raising it above his head, as soon as he had made it Natasha threw another snowball at Loki, causing the snowball Loki had made to fall on him. They grew closer and closer as each day went by, Loki had shown Natasha every part of the castle. On one of the days, they had a nice dinner together and afterwards they danced together in the ballroom of the castle, Natasha dressed in a long yellow dress and Loki dressed in a royal blue suit, after the dance he took her out to the balcony and showed her his mirror that let people see whatever they wanted to see. Natasha had asked the mirror to show her father, he was sick. Trying to find the castle, lost in the forest. Worry and panic filled her eyes.

"He's sick" she looked up at Loki.

"Go to him, go home and look after him" Loki told her.

"Thank you" she smiled and handed the mirror to him, but he pushed it back to her.

"Keep it to remember me" he smiled softly, Natasha kissed his cheek and left the castle, finding her father in the woods and taking him home.

When he woke up and saw Nat at the other side of the room.

"Natasha, how did you escape?" he asked her.

"I didn't escape, he let me go" Natasha replied with a smile.

"He let you go?"

"Yeah, he's changed, he's sweet and charming" Natasha replied.

Her dad was about to speak when there was a knock on the door, Natasha went to open it and it was Barton. A guy that lived in the town and claimed that he was in love with Nat.

"Barton, what are you doing here?" she asked him.

"I have come to check on you. You haven't been home for at least a month Nat" he answered.

"I've been away" she answered simply, Barton looked behind her shoulder to Natasha's father standing in the doorway.

"Surely you know where your daughter was Mr. Romanoff" Barton said to him.

"Yes, she was in a castle in the woods with a beast like creature keeping her prisoner" her dad confessed without thinking.

"A beast? Well, we must go and kill the beast!" Barton commanded to the huge crowd behind them, all of them cheered and Barton set off with them all carrying pitchforks, torches and everything else that they would need to kill the 'beast'

Natasha couldn't let that happen to Loki, when the whole village had gone off into the woods, she went against her father and rode the horse to the Loki's castle. When she had gotten there, the villagers were gone and Loki's friends scattered along the floor, just like they had been in a fight. There was no sign of Barton, but she could hear footsteps upstairs. She ran up, as the rain poured down and looked out at the balcony where Barton and Loki were in the middle of the battle. Barton kicked Loki off of the balcony and Loki held on for his life, as Barton jumped down trying to steady himself. As Natasha ran out to the balcony, Loki saw her and attempted to climb back up, that was when Barton stabbed the prince in the back, losing his grip and falling to his death. Loki nearly fell as well but Natasha hoisted him back up. He cupped her face in his hand, as the last petal was beginning to fall.

"You came back" he smiled weakly.

"Of course I did, I couldn't let anyone hurt you" she told him, tears welling in her eyes.

"At least I got to see you one last time" Loki whispered.

"Hey, don't speak like that. We're together now, everything's going to be fine" she said more to herself.

Loki's let out his last breath and his eyes closed, Natasha rested her head on his chest and cried into it.

"No, please. Please don't leave me" she cried. "I love you" she whispered as the last petal fell.

As the last petal fell, light surrounded Loki and he was raised to the sky, Natasha watched in shock as the man before her changed. His skin was no longer blue, but a pale peach. His eyes a jade green instead of ruby red, he was no longer in a Jotun form and never would be ever again. He was placed back down on the floor, and Natasha dared not approach him, thinking that he was still dead. That was when he awoke, he stood and turned to face her. He smiled brightly as he saw her, it was like seeing her in a whole new light.

"Nat, it's me. Loki" he told her. Natasha looked closer at him and noticed it was the same smile.

"It is you" she grinned and hugged him tightly, he returned the hug and kissed her softly.

After Loki had lost his Jotun form, all of his friends became themselves again. Fandral became tall, blonde with a small beard and moustache. Volstagg became shorter, bigger with his long scraggly ginger hair and beard. Sif became her tall dark haired self and Hogun became his tall dark haired and bearded self. Everything was as it should be.


End file.
